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Aldersgate Reconsidered, 133–46 Edited by Randy L In Aldersgate Reconsidered, 133–46 Edited by Randy L. Maddox. Nashville, TN: Kingswood Books, 1990. (This .pdf version reproduces pagination of printed form) ALDERSGATE: A TRADITION HISTORY Randy L. Maddox The 1988 commemoration of the 250th anniversary of the event of Aldersgate may well be remembered more for the renewed vigor it brought to debate about the meaning of this event than for any of its celebrations. One of our aims in this essay is to show why such debate was inevitable. Another aim is to highlight the dynamics of this debate and suggest some of its implications for understanding the place of Aldersgate in Wesley’s life and in later Wesleyan traditions. The Need for Tradition-Historical Investigation It is no secret that the Aldersgate event has been interpreted in a variety of ways by Wesley scholars and those in the various traditions descended from Wesley’s ministry. Indeed, Frederick Maser has developed a typology of these various readings that divides them into five main categories: 1) Those who accept the Aldersgate experience as an important watershed or conversion in Wesley’s life (Maser lists five varying specific descriptions of the nature of this watershed); 2) Those who deny that Aldersgate was a conversion experience, assigning that experience to some earlier date, while still recognizing Aldersgate’s importance as a religious crisis in Wesley’s life; 3) Those who deny that Aldersgate had any enduring significance for Wesley’s life—emphasizing, instead, some earlier date (usually 1725) as his conversion; 4) Those who stress the gradual nature of Wesley’s spiritual development and see Aldersgate as simply one step in a 133 steady process of growth; and 5) Those who believe that Aldersgate is one of many “conversions” in Wesley’s life.1 How could a single event spawn such a variety of interpretations? One obvious possibility is that the information which Wesley’s later interpreters have to work with is inconclusive. A quick reading of participants in the debate about the meaning of Aldersgate reveals that they spend much of their time dealing with the ambiguities of Wesley’s references to the event. These ambiguities have received extensive scholarly attention in recent years and the major textual dilemmas are now fairly clear.2 First: On the one hand, Wesley’s initial account of Aldersgate in his Journal presented it as a dramatic transition to a consistent Christian life, in explicit contrast with the perceived shortcomings of his earlier practice. On the other hand, Wesley added footnotes to the 1774 and 1775 editions of the Journal which significantly qualified this contrast. Moreover, the accounts in the full Journal cast doubt upon both Wesley’s initial pessimistic reading of his life before Aldersgate and his initial optimistic claims about the results of the event. Again: On the one hand, Wesley reprinted the extract of the Journal containing the Aldersgate account five times during his life. On the other hand, he almost never again mentioned Aldersgate explicitly in his Journal or other published works.3 Finally: On the one hand, Wesley made frequent chronological references that highlight 1738 as significant both to his own life and to the Methodist revival. On the other hand, these references are all quite general and may have referred to the beginning of open-air preaching or the organization of the first society rather than to the event of Aldersgate. In drawing our attention to these textual dilemmas, Wesley scholars have shown why there has been room for a debate about the significance of Aldersgate in the Wesleyan traditions. Indeed, the ambiguities are such that this debate cannot be settled on textual grounds alone. The consideration of other relevant aspects of the issue would appear to be necessary. The increased hermeneutical sensitivity of the last few decades confirms this need for considering other aspects of the issue. Contemporary hermeneutic philosophy has made us keenly aware that the act of interpretation is influenced by the cultural/historical assumptions of the interpreter’s context as much as by the object of interpretation and its context.4 This suggests that the differing interpretations of Aldersgate should be analyzed not only in the light of textual ambiguities but also from the perspective of the history of shifting theological concerns within the later Wesleyan traditions. The need for this 134 second type of analysis has been mentioned a couple of times in the discussion of Aldersgate (e.g., McIntosh 1969; and Snow 1963), but no extended treatment has been forthcoming. Hence, our initial foray into this promising field. Historical Shifts in the Interpretation of Aldersgate The purpose of a tradition-historical study is to increase an interpretive community’s awareness of shifts or developments in the history of its understanding of a classic text (or event). Central to such a study is the attempt to correlate shifting interpretations with broader changes in the self-understanding of the community. Thus, our task is to investigate correlations between changes in the general theological self-understanding of the Wesleyan traditions and their shifting interpretations of Aldersgate. 1791–1850: Aldersgate as Personal Conversion Event In the first half-century following Wesley’s death, Methodism was an adolescent movement seeking to find its own feet. During this time, it generally honored Wesley more as its founder than as its theological mentor or norm.5 Thus, the major literary productions of this period were funeral eulogies and triumphalistic biographies, rather than theological studies. When these early works mention Aldersgate, they generally portray it as Wesley’s “conversion.” Thereby, they were primarily re-presenting Wesley’s own early evaluation, for they depended heavily on the early volumes of his Journal for their account.6 Indicative of such dependence, these works typically do not clarify what they meant by “conversion.” If they evidence any distinctive concern, it was to defend Wesley from charges of enthusiasm by stressing that it was a transition to which he was brought by calm rational and scriptural considerations.7 In other words, they portrayed Aldersgate more as Wesley’s personal conversion event than as an exemplary conversion experience. The suggestion that, during this time period, Aldersgate was regarded more as an intriguing event in Wesley’s life than as a normative model for subsequent Methodist piety is lent further support by the Methodist centennial celebrations of 1839. The event that British Methodists chose to commemorate as most crucial to their founding was the establishment of the first Society in 1739. This choice sparked a mild protest from Thomas Jackson (1838), who argued that 135 the centenary of Aldersgate would have been more appropriate. Nonetheless, both the centennial and sesqui-centennial of Aldersgate passed without formal commemoration.8 While defended as Wesley’s “conversion,” it had not yet been adopted as the defining metaphor of Methodist belief and practice. 1850–1870: Initial Questions About Aldersgate as “Conversion” In the absence of a stated definition, one is left with the impression that the previous biographies assumed some version of Wesley’s Dictionary definition of conversion: “a thorough change of heart and life from sin to holiness.”9 The problem with such a definition of what happened at Aldersgate, of course, is that it is not at all clear that this event was such a dramatic and thorough change in Wesley’s life—as he admitted later himself. As such, it was only a matter of time before designations of Aldersgate as Wesley’s “conversion” provoked debate. One of the earliest public debates took place in the pages of the Wesleyan Methodist Association Magazine in 1854. A letter from a reader (Miller 1854) argued that Wesley’s early piety and good works demonstrated that he was already a Christian, so Aldersgate could not have been his conversion. The editors (Anonymous 1854) admitted that the pre-Aldersgate Wesley would have been saved if he had died, but insisted that Aldersgate was his conversion from trusting in his own righteousness to trusting in Christ for salvation. So began a continuing variety of refined definitions of Aldersgate as a “conversion.” The most striking refined definition during this period came from Robert Brown. Brown authored one of the few nineteenth-century considerations of Wesley as a theologian. He argued that Wesley’s theology was essentially a matter of morals, drawn directly from the conscience. In keeping with this general characterization, he suggested that Aldersgate was not a total conversion but only one “from a comparatively low standard of Christian morals . to a high standard”!10 Given the rigorous nature of Wesley’s early life, this suggestion has found few supporters. Rather, it stands as vivid evidence of how easily Aldersgate could take on the hue of the position from which it was being viewed. 136 1870–1900: Aldersgate as the Rejection of High-Church Bigotry One of the most significant issues with which nineteenth-century British Methodism struggled was its relationship to the Anglican tradition from which it had come. Wesley remained an Anglican priest until his death and never tired of claiming that all of his distinctive doctrinal claims could be found in the Anglican standards of doctrine. Shortly after his death British Methodists followed the earlier example of their American counterparts and officially separated from the Church of England. Some leaders helped facilitate this decision by obscuring the most explicit evidences of Wesley’s (high-church) Anglican loyalties and stressing those aspects of his life or work that favored the (low-church) dissenting traditions.11 The debate concerning Wesley’s apparent high-church sympathies and their significance for later Methodism became increasingly reactionary with the emergence of the Oxford Movement, reaching a fever pitch in the 1870s.
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